Friday, May 22, 2015

History: The Year is 1580

Too Much Silver Limits Spending in the Ottoman Empire -- The Sultan has run out of money to pay his elite soldiers so he has to limit his wars to only the bare necessities. (Choke. Cough.)

When Fighting for Your Rights Goes Wrong -- The Catholics in England are getting along, sort of, but the Continental Catholics want to poke their finger in the eye of Queen Elizabeth. I talk about the civil right movement in the USA and how outsiders tended to stir things up.

60 Years in a Fog: Portugal is Annexed by Spain -- King Sebastian of Portugal dies without an heir so the King of Spain claims the throne. I talk about the granaries for the poor set up by King Sebastian.

Too Much Silver Limits Spending in the Ottoman Empire

Janissary soldiers are young Christian slaves trained with strict
discipline to be Turkish special forces. They are so good, that they are
paid a salary and they have their own pension plan. (Promotional
brochures on demand. Please drop by the recruiting office.) Without
putting too fine a point on it.... they are carrying guns and they know
how to use them really, really well. You don't want them unhappy and
this year they are officially UNHAPPY. Silver coming from the New World
has caused inflation, but taxes and salaries are not adjusted for
inflation. The soldiers are risking their lives for pennies on the
dollar and the government is not taking in enough revenue to pay for the
increased price of everything. Rebellions are springing up. Eventually
things will settle down but this has stopped the rapid expansion of the
Ottoman Empire. To save money they will hire mercenaries as needed and
as they can afford it.
[1][2]

My Take by Alex ShruggedWhen
the US Constitution was written, it was well known that government
spending had to be restrained, so they limited tax revenues to tariffs
and excise taxes on booze and such. They believed that a smaller pool of
money would force competing interests to cooperate. That was supposed
to be a big fight with few winners. It also meant fewer wars or at least
shorter wars since every dollar spent on war was one less dollar spent
on that farmers aid package. But Prohibition cut off a major source of
tax revenue so the government replaced it with an income tax. When
Prohibition was repealed (so to speak) the tax on booze returned but the
income tax never went away. The income tax supplies the government with
an enormous pool of money and it adjusts to inflation, pushing tax
payers into higher and higher brackets as salaries rise to match higher
prices. The government will NEVER give up this system voluntarily. That
train has left the station. There is just too much money involved and
too few people deciding what to do with it. We are heading for that big
bend in the track at 100 miles an hour. I sure hope a rock doesn't hit
us. [3]

When Fighting for Your Rights Goes Wrong

In England, Catholics are skipping the Anglican services and praying
at home. These Catholics must pay a fine for a lack of attendance. Since
most of the English Catholics are submitting to the fine, Queen
Elizabeth the 1st remained hopeful that the Catholics would eventually
be drawn to the Anglican church.... that is, until Catholics
missionaries from the Continent (meaning Europe) arrived in England to
convert the Protestants. They do so in such a public manner, even
setting up their own printing press and distributing pamphlets
criticizing the Queen. The English Catholics are not going along with
the Continental Catholics and their confrontive ways. At the Siege of
Smerwick, Ireland, Catholic forces made up of Italian and Spanish
soldiers are forced to surrender unconditionally. When the English Army
enters the town, 600 Catholics are executed. By next year the English
parliament will call for a law to make the practice of Catholicism high
treason.
[4][5]

My Take by Alex ShruggedDuring
the civil rights movement of the 1960s there was a push to get black
people registered to vote. Many Southern white people were trying to
discourage them by blowing up churches. A KKK bomber came to Mississippi
to blow up the president of the local synagogue. (I think that was in
Jackson, Mississippi.) The sheriff caught the bomber as he was coming
across the lawn. There were a lot of good Christians in the South who
were willing to help out black people and Jews. I'm not just saying that
or hoping that. I know that. My point is that it may seem brave (and
often it is) to come swooping in from out of town, lead a protest, and
then leave. Just remember that there are people left behind who must
live with the consequences of your actions. [6]Further comments (optional):
I am old enough to have cycled through several polite labels for black
people such as "colored," "black," "American African," and "African
American." This last one seems oddest of all. I know Africans, FROM
AFRICA, who are white. Secondly I remember watching TV news coverage of a
riot in England. The newsman wanted to say, "African-Americans are
running down the street" but he couldn't. They were English. Were they
African-Anglos? Black-Brits? I just don't care any more.

60 Years in a Fog: Portugal is Annexed by Spain

The young King Sebastian the 1st of Portugal has disappeared. It is
believed he has been killed in battle but without a body, the rumors
persist that he is simply lost and will one day reappear out of the fog.
(Really. I'm not kidding.) He has no heir so there is a fight for the
throne. There are even people who come forward claiming to be King
Sebastian himself. Finally, the King of Spain, Phillip the 2nd, takes
the throne for himself and joins the crowns of Portugal and Spain. It is
a more-or-less peaceful annexation. His claim to the throne is
reasonable (as reasonable as any other claimant) and he is the big dog
in this hunt. Portugal will remain as a separate state within Spain but
for the next 60 years they will be in decline.
[7][8][9]

My Take by Alex ShruggedDuring
his reign, King Sebastian had set up communal granaries for the poor.
These granaries provided loans, and seeds so that the poor could grow
their own food. (Imagine that! Helping yourself out of poverty by the
sweat of your own brow. The poor were expected to pay the loans back
once they were productive again. It seems to me there are two kinds of
poor: those who are disabled due to illness or injury and those
able-bodied poor who, due to circumstances or plain laziness, need a
jump-start (or a swift kick in the backside) to get going again. In the
Bible, the poor came to the fields and walked behind the harvesters
picking up whatever they dropped or missed. The charity of the Bible
required some work. [10]